Apocalypto

Did anyone catch the surreal moment where Castro called Bush "apocalyptic"?

Here's the scoop from the AP (courtesy of USA Today):

Fidel Castro called George W. Bush "an apocalyptic person" on Friday, hours after the U.S. president signed a bill that will pay for military operations in Iraq without setting a timetable for troop withdrawal.

In his latest comments as he convalesces from intestinal surgery, the 80-year-old Cuban leader accused Bush of "faking rationality" and manipulating U.S. public opinion.

OK - "faking rationality" is kind of clever. But "apocalyptic"? Isn't that imagery kind of... religious? Has Castro seen the light of the end days? I blogged here about the possibility of the new Latin American fusion of Catholicism and socialism, as championed by former altar-boy Hugo Chavez. Castro seems to have given Chavez his seal of approval - maybe Chavez has returned the favor with some Bible study?

Also on this subject - the Vatican responded to accusations this week from Chavez and others that the early days of Christianity in the New World weren't all wine and roses:

The pope did not apologize, as some indigenous and Latin American leaders have demanded. However, he did say that it was impossible to ignore the dark "shadows" and "unjustified crimes" that accompanied the evangelization of the New World by Roman Catholic priests in the 15th and 16th Centuries.

Chavez said in a televised statement, "How can he say that the evangelization wasn't imposed if they arrived here with arms and entered with blood, lead and fire?" The comments that incited the fierce opposition from Chavez:

Indigenous populations, [the pope] said at the time, welcomed their European colonizers because they were "secretly longing" for Christ "without realizing it." Conversion to Christianity "did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture," he added.

The pope made no mention of forced conversions, epidemic illnesses, massacres, enslavement and other abuses that most historians agree accompanied colonization.

The interesting thing here is that Chavez seems to be trying to bring along the Catholic Church in his view of the socialist future of Latin America (as opposed to Castro's more party-line atheism), but it looks like there are limits to his politicking there. Also interesting - maybe more so - that the Vatican responded to his critiques quickly and with surprising sensitivity to remarks by someone the rest of the world mostly sees as an enterprising demagogue.

A rocky beginning to a beautiful friendship?